


Small Bright Gifts

by tarysande



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Cullen/mage Trevelyan (pre-romance), Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-25
Updated: 2016-07-25
Packaged: 2018-07-26 18:43:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,998
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7585702
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tarysande/pseuds/tarysande
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>And do you notice how often they are presented to you, these small bright gifts, waiting for you to open them?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Small Bright Gifts

Cullen woke gasping for air, feeling as though stones heaped on his chest were slowly caving his ribs into his lungs. A hand he couldn’t stop from trembling closed around the hilt of his blade before he remembered where he was. The chantry in Haven. Safe. As safe as anyone could be at the heart of the budding Inquisition with holes ripped into the sky and the world, and the fate of everything resting on the slender shoulders of a woman with a glowing hand. The Herald of Andraste. A mage.

Knowing a return to sleep would only invite further nightmares, Cullen pushed himself upright. On the other side of the room, Josephine snored softly under a pile of blankets, taking up as much space as the narrow bed allowed, arms flung wide, throat and belly vulnerable. In the third bed, Leliana made a smaller hump in the darkness, curled as tightly into herself as Cullen himself slept, and she breathed in sleep as quietly as she moved awake.

Foolish oversight, really, to have all of them crammed into one room like fish in a barrel. The right attack at the hand of the right assassin or a significant enough force of soldiers—or a single traitor—could rob the Inquisition of all its leadership save Cassandra—and the Herald, he supposed—in one swoop.

The tightness in his chest refused to ease. The walls pressed too close in the darkness, and he could not tell if it was longing for lyrium or fear of purplish light and the soft voice of a demon pushing so hard against his lungs, his breath, his stuttering heartbeat. Perhaps he’d been dreaming of great bronze statues coming to life; that one plagued him often. Subtler still, he sometimes dreamed of children—Kinloch’s children, the Gallows children—watching him with empty eyes beneath the sunburst brand of Tranquility.

The Herald, he thought, swinging his legs over the side of the bed and leaning heavily on them, would not have survived under Meredith. He sometimes dreamed of her eyes, too, empty of mirth, empty of tears, empty of the bright-burning desire to help that seemed to drive her so relentlessly. Sometimes he dreamed his was the hand holding the brand.

He dressed as silently as only one accustomed to living in a barracks could—few heaped vitriol like soldiers woken before they were needed—ignoring the tremor in his hands, and forgoing his armor. His sword he belted around his waist, though he did not bother with the trio of daggers he usually kept on his person. He ignored the fur-trimmed mantle he’d chosen as his uniform, opting for the greater anonymity of a simple, if finely-woven, cloak.

The pressure began to ease as soon as he slipped out into the open space of the chantry. By the time he nodded his way past the guards at the main doors and stepped into the cold air of Haven at night, the clenched fist of panic was nearly a memory.

He walked to stop himself wanting lyrium. Some days were worse than others and some days better, but the insistent voice was never completely silent. He’d gotten better at denying it, at reasoning himself through the waves of maddening _need._

Night was the worst time. Too much quiet, too many thoughts, nowhere to hide and nothing to distract him. The day kept him busy, gave him purpose; planning kept him focused and sharp. He thought about returning to the chantry and burying himself in paperwork, but it would be noted and commented upon, it would erode the sense of confidence that things were under control—or so Josephine told him.

Mostly, he thought, she worried about how little he slept, and he could not fault her that.

So he did not return to his paperwork, moving instead through the sleeping town. The tavern was quiet, for a change, not that he was tempted by it. He did not need to be told the danger of reaching for wine or ale or whiskey when what he wanted was lyrium. He did not want one to replace the other, even temporarily.

Most houses he passed were dark, with curtains drawn or shutters closed. The smell of woodsmoke filled the air, reminding him not of nightmares or nights in Circle towers or even the terrible destruction of Kirkwall, but of the warmth of his childhood kitchen and the smell of his mother’s hair when she’d been cooking. He took one deep breath and then another, releasing the last of the pressure in his chest.

The house where the Herald usually slept was dark, not that he’d have expected otherwise. He wondered if she’d return from this journey with yet another new recruit; Cullen was still trying to figure out where the Iron Bull and his Chargers fit into the roster, and he wasn’t certain he’d have invited the chaos of Sera if left to his own devices.

Like Hawke in Kirkwall, the Herald seemed predisposed to collect strays. Hawke’s had served her well enough; perhaps the Herald’s would prove equally useful.

He hoped none of them nurtured thoughts of explosions. Rifts leaking demons were bad enough.

Cullen was relieved when every soldier he passed asked his business. To have neglected to do so would have ended poorly for them; about this, in particular, his orders were firm. With the never-ending ebb and flow of strangers in and out of Haven, the Inquisition’s position was too tenuous, too new, too rife with unknown quantities. Much as he respected Leliana and her network of spies, it was a foolish soldier—a foolish person, and a critically inept commander—who left the entirety of their defense up to the warnings those spies might provide.

The training ground was empty, though work at the forge continued day and night, in shifts. Cullen refused to send men and women into battle without armor, without adequate weaponry. Much as he appreciated the influx of farmers and refugees toting ancient blades or scythes more used to mowing down grain than demons, a soldier needed a weapon they could trust not to break in the heat of battle. The scythes became swords; leather was retooled, padded, plated.

It wasn’t enough, of course, but better than it had been. In time, if the battle was not brought to them, his farmers might make decent foot soldiers, and he would not feel as though he was sending lambs to hunt down wolves.

Perhaps then he would sleep more soundly at night.

He knew he heard the footsteps behind him because she wanted him to hear her approach, not because she stumbled or made a mistake.

Like him, Leliana had not bothered with the trappings that made her so recognizable during the day. She wore no armor, no carefully-draped hood. Her bright hair hung as sleep-disheveled around her face as he imagined his own must be, devoid even of the little braids she usually wore. She carried no weapon as obvious as his sword, but he did not doubt she was armed. Her daggers had not been left behind, even if her bow had.

“We might spar,” she said, which he did not expect, “if you think it would help.”

“I will only end up nodding off over the war table tomorrow,” he replied. “Though I’d not decline your assistance with my archers, if you’re able to spare the time some afternoon. My skill with a bow is passable, but hardly up to the task.”

She made a sound of assent and passed a slender hand through her hair. “The Herald returns tomorrow. I had a raven after you retired.”

He nodded.

“I think, perhaps, a decision about the mages and templars must be reached soon, no?”

His lips twisted before he could think better of it. A dagger appeared in Leliana’s hand, and a moment later lodged in the throat of a practice dummy. Softly, she said, “It is rumored you dislike her.”

“What?” Startled, he turned to face her completely, brows rising. “That’s preposterous.”

An irritatingly knowing little smile played about Leliana’s lips, and he half-wished she were wearing her hood so the shadows might hide it. “I did not say I believed so, but it… would not do, for that rumor to gain traction. You must see this.”

“Of course I see it. I just don’t see how the rumor began in the first place.”

Leliana linked her hands behind her back and rocked onto her heels. “You might attempt to have a conversation with her. Or keep yourself from running the opposite way every time she draws near.”

“I—I do _not—_ ”

Leliana’s smile vanished, replaced by a too-incisive narrowing of the eyes.

“She’s busy,” Cullen protested. “I try not to take too much of her time.”

It sounded a pathetic excuse, even to his own ears. Leliana did not deign to offer a response, only strolling over to the dummy to retrieve her weapon. “Is it because she is a mage?”

“No,” he said, too quickly. “Not—must we speak of this?”

“We _mustn’t_ speak of anything, of course. I only thought you might… appreciate an ear. A discreet one. One that, perhaps, knows more of your past than any others in Haven.”

He brushed his palm down his face, but did not hide behind it. “You mean Kinloch Hold, I suppose. It’s no great secret. Cassandra knows.”

“Does she know the memory of it still wakes you screaming?” Leliana spoke so gently Cullen thought his heart would break of it. “I was there, you remember. I saw what they did to you. I—it haunts me still, all these years later, and I was not the one who lived it.”

He bent at the waist and retrieved a stone from the hard ground. It was refreshingly, comfortingly cool between his fingers. When it had warmed in the heat of his palm, he threw it. It bounced off the same throat of the same dummy Leliana had earlier speared with her blade.

“I am not… _bothered_ she’s a mage. Truly, in some ways I find myself almost… relieved. This business of rifts and demons and mages and templars—at least she has a lifetime of context with which to view it. For all her smiles, all her laughter, all her wide-eyed wonder, I never doubt she recognizes the seriousness of the situation, the precariousness. Because she is a Trevelyan, she understands the politics; because she’s a mage, she knows the threat magic run rampant poses.”

Leliana twirled her dagger like a little girl making ribbons dance. “You notice her laughter, then, after all. And her smiles.”

He glared at her.

“And do you notice how often they are presented to you, these small bright gifts, waiting for you to open them?”

“Don’t tease, Leliana.”

“I would tease Cassandra, perhaps, or Josie. Never you.”

Her smile said otherwise, but he found his own lips curving in response. He rolled his shoulders and found them less stiff, less apt to creep up around his ears. He was not yet ready to find his bed again, but more sleep no longer seemed outside the realm of possibility.

“I don’t want to talk about… the other thing,” he admitted. “Not now. I promise to… seek you out. If I should like to.”

“I was a Chantry sister once, Ser Cullen. If nothing else, confession might prove comforting.”

“Conversation,” he demurred. “I’ve confessed these sins so often even the Maker must be sick of hearing them.” Brushing back his cloak in half a bow, he added, “And perhaps just a little sparring. I’d like to know what my archers are in for.”

“I do appreciate that you do not send them to do what you would not yourself.” She offered a dip of a curtsey, graceful as a dance step. “But I ought to warn you, Commander, I play dirty.”

“Oh, Sister Nightingale.” He laughed. “I play well.”


End file.
